


little white flowers all up in her hair

by Kavi Leighanna (kleighanna)



Series: In Bed with a Killer [1]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Baby!Fic, F/M, Kid!Fic, Tumblr Ask Box Fic, cait'verse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-17
Updated: 2015-04-17
Packaged: 2018-03-23 09:58:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3763846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kleighanna/pseuds/Kavi%20Leighanna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He is an internationally renowned assassin and arms dealer. His name makes people tremble in their boots. The mere mention of his reputation causes chaos and fear. </p><p>Too bad his daughter never got that memo.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

A little sound wakes her. 

She’d slept light before giving birth to her daughter and after, well, sleep is a precious commodity. She wakes when the house creeks sometimes, worried that it’s her daughter, that someone’s coming for her daughter. 

But this, this is definitely… Something. 

 

She’s out of bed in an instant, the gun in her hand from the bedside table. Ian’ll kill her if she has the gun by their daughter but what he doesn’t know-Well, actually, she’d be a little more concerned if Ian were dead asleep beside her, but his side of the bed is empty too. 

She’s at their bedroom door when she hears it again. It’s a giggle, one she is intimately familiar with. There’s a smile dancing across her face as she pads down the hall, too confident in her abilities and her husband’s complete absorption with their daughter to grant her a few minutes to just watch. 

And she is so, so glad she gets those few minutes. 

She makes out Ian’s form first, long and stretched out along the floor of their west wing - family wing, Ian’s always correcting her - sitting room. The family space they chose to decorate for the holidays. Cait is next to him, her tiny body - and God, she is still so small - nestled right against his shoulder. 

And completely under their shining tree.

“They listen,” Ian’s saying, reaching up to flick a branch, make the lights shimmer. Cait’s face is utterly captivated, a combination, Emily’s sure, of the lights and Ian’s voice. She knows how captivating that voice can be. 

“So whenever you’re having a bad day, you can come here, just like this. Even when you’re mad at Momma and me.” Ian leans over and kisses Cait’s head. “You will always be safe under your tree.”

“Fairytales? If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were going soft, Valhalla.”

Ian’s glare is half-hearted at best because he can’t seem to summon the whole thing when Cait’s around. She grins because even when he does, she’s immune. She’s been immune since day one. 

“You’re interrupting.”

She hums, steps into the room and towards her family. 

“Mama!”

Ian’s hand on Cait’s stomach keeps her from sitting up, from whacking her head on the tree and the specifically plastic ornaments they switched to for the family tree when their daughter shattered one as an infant. But Cait flails. 

“Daddy!”

Emily chuckles, drops down to her knees then flips to her back, shuffles beneath the tree with her family. Her hand joins Ian’s on Cait’s stomach, but their stubborn, head-strong daughter is having none of it. She rolls into Emily, hand clenching in her mother’s pajama shirt. She laughs softly. 

“Hi, Baby.”

“Mama.”

She watches Ian’s hand comb through Cait’s hair. It’s getting long. His eyes are so blue, so warm. Cait’s eyes. Her heart swells. 

“Is Daddy telling you about the fairies in the tree?”

“Mine sparkles,” Cait says, legs kicking. 

“Shh, Poppet, settle.”

And Cait does, almost immediately. At least for a moment. Then she’s flipping, turning back to her father. 

“More sparkles, Daddy.”

Well, he can’t say no to that. 


	2. Chapter 2

He watches her one night, her tiny toddler body curled up beneath a bright purple comforter. She’s cuddling a stuffed dalek - his wife’s doing, most certainly - and still in slumber. His daughter. His little girl. 

“Ian.”

“Couldn’t sleep,” he rumbles back, even as he lifts an arm. She slips easily into his hold, as wily and graceful as ever. She loops her arm around his back. 

“She’s fine,” Emily murmurs. “Safe. I know you know this.”

He sighs. “We’ve both made enemies-”

His wife hums and he quiets immediately. He knows every argument she wants to make so he turns instead and presses his forehead to hers. This time, she chuckles and gives him a soft smile as she brushes her nose against his once, twice, three times. It’s sweet and soft and such a juxtaposition to the formidable and powerful woman his wife is that it makes him smile. 

“Come on,” she says. “Leave her sleep. She’ll be up at the crack of dawn and I need way more sleep if I’m going to deal with your hyper child before the sun.”

He lets her pull him away but pauses in the doorway to look back. Cait turns over in her sleep and he smiles as Emily’s hand tightens in his. His wife and his daughter. His little miracles.


	3. Chapter 3

“No.”

Ian’s eyebrow climbs his forehead as he looks down at the little girl, spitting image of her bloody mother, complete with her arms folded over her chest. He’s at a loss, to be honest. Bedtime is Emily’s thing, has always been Emily’s thing (he does wake up because there’s something about his little girl snuggling in the early morning hours that means  _everything_  to him) but she’s away on an assignment (“I hate it when Momma goes on long trips,” Cait had said, and Ian had wholeheartedly agreed) leaving father and daughter to forge for themselves. 

It’s the first long trip (assignment) she’s taken since Cait’s birth three years before. Neither of them like them much now, and maybe they’re winding down for retirement, or maybe it’s because of Cait (neither of them had thought about kids, but then Emily had gotten pregnant and, well, now they’re here) but either way, she’s been gone too long. A week was too long, and that week is now stretching into two, two and a half, and he thinks both he and Cait are at the ends of their ropes. 

Because yes, there are things he cannot do for his girl. Braid her hair for one, or apparently set out her clothes right, or give her a bath with the right rubber duckies (“The  _green_  ones, Daddy, pink is for the pool!”) but outright defiance? This is not what he’s used to.

“Caitriona-”

“No.” And she does stamp her foot this time, stubborn as can be. He thinks about hoisting her over his shoulder, but she’s proven wily (and he swears if she ends up with her mother’s agility he’s just going to call it quits because he still can’t beat his wife on the mats, let alone this little slip of a girl that he adores so clearly).

“It wasn’t a question.” Because bathtime never is. 

And then the worst thing happens. He knows he hasn’t raised his voice, knows that he hasn’t done anything that he’s never done before, but Cait’s eyes fill with tears and a split second later she’s outright wailing. 

“I want Momma!" 

And his heart breaks, it really does. His hard, assassin’s heart shatters because God, he wants Emily too. So he sighs and tugs Cait close, despite her squirming. 

"I know, poppet,” he says quietly in her ear. It’s a thing Emily does sometimes when she’s this upset, just talks to her quietly. “I miss her too." 

Cait’s little arms wrap tight around his neck (she’s going to be her mother and dear God, he does not envy the world when it happens, he really doesn’t) and she clings with all her might, sobbing into her shoulder. He’s never really considered that this whole Emily-on-assignment has stressed her out as much as it does him. 

Eventually, her sobs calm and as he sits, propped against her bed, he feels an idea forming. 

"Tell you what,” he says, shifting Cait until he can see her tiny little tear-streaked face. “We’ll do something special.”

Cait looks wary (and he refuses to see himself in that look) but intrigued. She’s curious, their little one. Of course she is. 

“Let’s go see what bubbles Momma’s got,” he tells her, already pushing himself up. “You can use the big tub in Momma and Daddy’s bathroom and we’ll pick a book and read in the big bed after.”

Cait lights up like Christmas. So he lets her play in their swimming pool sized tub (Emily likes a good soak after assignments) and then bundles her up in warm pajamas before he tucks her in beside him. She falls asleep before the end of the story, and Ian does seriously consider moving her to her own bed (they have rules about Cait sleeping in her parents’ bed, it’s not a habit they want her picking up) but he doesn’t (can’t). Instead, he settles a hand on her tiny tummy and falls asleep himself.

(That’s how Emily finds them when she finally gets home at 4am and usually they have rules about showering before handling Cait because of gunpowder or dirt, but Ian doesn’t even shift as she climbs into bed and wraps herself around the tiny family neither of them thought they’d ever have.)


End file.
